Memoirs from Beyond the Tomb

François-René de Chateaubriand

Introduced by Philip Mansel

Chateaubriand requested that his memoirs remain unpublished until after his death lest he be forced to be ‘less frank and truthful’. The result is a hugely entertaining autobiography, providing a vivid picture of France during the most tumultuous period of her history.

Memoirs from Beyond the Tomb

‘Just a note to thank you very much for sending me the beautiful-looking volume of Chateaubriand’s memoirs you’ve published. It looks glorious & I’m proud of being associated with it.’
Andrew Roberts

By the time he came to write his memoirs, François-René de Chateaubriand had lived enough to fill the biographies of ten men. Born in St Malo in 1768 to a wealthy family, he was to become a soldier, a traveller, a politician and a celebrated writer. Disturbed by the violent excesses of the Revolution, he fled to America in 1791, where he claimed to have interviewed George Washington. Always a monarchist at heart, he joined a Royalist army on returning to France in 1792 and reluctantly got married, but was wounded in battle and exiled to England, leaving behind his new bride.

Returning to France for a second time – on this occasion leaving behind an English mistress – Chateaubriand became a favourite of Napoleon who appointed him minister to Valais. However, disgusted by Napoleon’s decision to execute Louis XVI’s cousin, Chateaubriand left once again and travelled through Greece, Palestine and Egypt. On his return to France he wrote a damning criticism of Napoleon, who threatened to have him ‘sabred on the steps of the Tuileries’.

Following the Hundred Days War and Napoleon’s final defeat, he became a French peer and state minister, eventually rising to the office of Minister of Foreign Affairs. However, after the July Revolution, he refused to swear allegiance to the new king and effectively ended his political career. Living as a recluse in Paris he spent the last 15 years of his life writing his memoirs, which were published to great acclaim after his death in 1848. In his day Chateaubriand was the most celebrated author of the First Empire, and his influence on French literature, especially on Lamartine and Victor Hugo, is incalculable.

Memoirs from Beyond the Tomb is an extraordinary account of a uniquely adventurous and frenzied life, described by historian Philip Mansel in his introduction as ‘a masterpiece’. Bristling with exotic adventures, heroic battles and ‘the loneliness of a restless soul’, it conveys not just the character of the man but the character of an age. This edition features 12 pages of coloured plates and a frontispiece, as well as 8 integrated pencil sketches sourced from the Louvre, depicting the life of the author, and printed endpapers.

‘The hard cover edition is excellent, and worthy of the great man!’
Philip Mansel

Production Details

Abridged edition using the 1961 Robert Baldick translation.

Bound in blocked cloth

Set in Van Dijck

416 pages

Frontispiece and 12 pages of coloured plates

8 black & white integrated images

Printed endpapers

10″ x 6¼″

About François-René de Chateaubriand

François-René de Chateaubriand (1768–1848) was a French
writer, politician and diplomat, and was considered the founder of
French Romanticism. Born in St Malo the last of ten children to an
aristocratic family, Chateaubriand received an army commission aged
seventeen in 1786. Disturbed by the excesses of the Revolution, he
departed for America in 1791 but returned the following year after
receiving news of the arrest of Louis XVI. After marrying, he joined
the royalist army but was wounded at the battle of Thionville and was
exiled to England for seven years. His Romantic novel Atala was published
in 1801 to immediate success, and shortly afterwards his apology
to Christianity, Le Génie du christianisme (1802), won favour with both
royalists and Napoleon alike. Appointed secretary to the legation to
the Holy See in 1803, he resigned his post the following year in protest
at the execution of the Duc d’Enghien. After the Bourbon Restoration,
Chateaubriand was made a viscount and state minister, and eventually
became ambassador to Prussia, and the UK, and Minister of Foreign
Affairs in 1822. He spent the last fifteen years of his life in Paris, writing
much of his Mémoires, which were published to great acclaim shortly
after his death.

About Robert Baldick

Robert Baldick (1927–72) was a fellow of Pembroke College,
Oxford, and of the Royal Society of Literature. He was a scholar of
French literature, writer, joint editor of the Penguin Classics series with
Betty Radice, and a well-known translator. His books include biographies
of Joris-Karl Huysmans, Frédérick Lemaître and Henry Murger,
and a history of the Siege of Paris. Baldick edited and translated The
Goncourt Journals, as well as works by Gustave Flaubert, Chateaubriand,
Jean-Paul Sartre, Jules Verne, Henri Barbusse and Georges Simenon.

About Philip Mansel

Philip Mansel (1951–) is a historian of France and the Middle East,
whose books include Louis XVIII (1981), The Court of France 1789–1830
(1989), Constantinople: City of the World’s Desire 1453–1924 (1995), Paris
between Empires (2001), Levant: Splendour and Catastrophe on the Mediterranean
(2010) and Aleppo: The Rise and Fall of Syria’s Great Merchant City
(2016). Mansel is also editor of The Court Historian, journal of the Society
for Court Studies, and is currently working on a biography of
Louis XIV.

Reviews

"For anyone that questions themselves on whether to buy this book, based on the idea that it is a collection and not the entirety of the work, take note that it is nevertheless a wonderful collection w..." [read more]

"For anyone that questions themselves on whether to buy this book, based on the idea that it is a collection and not the entirety of the work, take note that it is nevertheless a wonderful collection with an appropriately crafted shell. I find the Author brilliant and timeless in thought and story, and for any lover of Folio, I would regret to have discovered Chateaubriand from any volume or format without having obtained this one." [hide full review]

Review by xxxxxxxxx on 2nd Sep 2016

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3/5

"Buyers should note that although not made explicit in the description above, this volume is a selection from the original work, not the complete writings."